Transactions (Transact-SQL)

A transaction is a single unit of work. If a transaction is successful, all of the data modifications made during the transaction are committed and become a permanent part of the database. If a transaction encounters errors and must be canceled or rolled back, then all of the data modifications are erased.

SQL Server operates in the following transaction modes.

Autocommit transactions

Each individual statement is a transaction.

Explicit transactions

Each transaction is explicitly started with the BEGIN TRANSACTION statement and explicitly ended with a COMMIT or ROLLBACK statement.

Implicit transactions

A new transaction is implicitly started when the prior transaction completes, but each transaction is explicitly completed with a COMMIT or ROLLBACK statement.

Batch-scoped transactions

Applicable only to multiple active result sets (MARS), a Transact-SQL explicit or implicit transaction that starts under a MARS session becomes a batch-scoped transaction. A batch-scoped transaction that is not committed or rolled back when a batch completes is automatically rolled back by SQL Server.